Try Harder

, 1

I was playing a Wii game with my son recently and even though I won round after round within this one game (unusual when I play my son), the program kept popping up with the words:

This immediately began a war between my old perfectionism flesh pattern which wants to try harder out of my own resources until I’m twisted into a pretzel and dizzy with performance fever and the new creation I am in Christ which fought back against the notion that I am never good enough.  My son must have thought me nuts when I talked back to the game, resisting it’s performance label.

You see, I knew the truth.  I knew that I was leading the game and I was already trying my hardest, and to pressure me to do more would be to create a crazy cycle that many of us have been in for years, if not decades:

  • Try harder and get more enslaved to our performance, never quite being enough!
  • Try harder and never quite live in victory!
  • Try harder and live under various strongholds and the enemy’s shaming about those strongholds!
  • Try harder and never experience the truly phenomenal grace of Christ!
  • Try harder and believe the lie that what we do and how well we perform is a value of WHO WE ARE!
  • Try harder, believing that we can work our way to heaven–a downright impossibility!
Instead, I thought, “Thank God for His grace and that He has declared Christ in me as enough! Thank You, God, that I do not have to try harder, and I pray for those who misunderstand Christianity as a religion of ‘trying harder.’  Nothing could be further from the truth.”

(Photograph by Joshua Woodmansee)

“I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.  If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.  If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.  My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.” (John 15:5-8)

If you are in Christ (meaning you have asked Jesus into your heart and life accepting his death on the cross as the punishment for your sins and trusted in Him alone to save you and make you new) you are enough.  Period.  When God looks at you He sees the righteousness of Jesus Christ.  It is Christ in you that can bear fruit through you when you are submitted to Him.  Apart from Christ, we can do absolutely nothing of lasting value.  So for those who are struggling with addiction, food strongholds, financial woes, mental health issues, or are just trying to get a leg up on your problems, the answer is not to try harder, but to ABIDE IN CHRIST.

Matthew Henry’s commentary says abiding in Christ is to “live upon his promises,” be “led by his Spirit” and to depend on, “adhere to” and “derive supplies from him.”  See the difference?  I do, and it’s made all the difference too!

Matthew 11:28 says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”  Jesus Christ and His finished work on the cross is the ONLY one who can save us from the “try harder” lie.  Anything other than Christ is futile.